Fox-Trot (name unconfirmed!) Concept
Introduction
Fox-Trot (name unconfirmed!) is fast-paced 2D shooter / platformer for the PC thrusting the player into the role of Trot, a simple farmer caught up in a devious plot to kidnap the ravishing Princess . Trot takes it upon himself to save the Princess and bring the kidnappers to justice!
Background
Fox-Trot is implemented using PopCap's “SexyAppFramework” with the BASS audio library.
Description
You begin play just outside your farm house, having seen the Princess' kidnappers shooting overhead in a low flying plane, Princess screaming. You grab your hunting rifle and hoe and make chase.
Up ahead – across your field – is a lake. The only way across is to jump onto an abandoned raft. Up overhead, the kidnappers have turned around to make a bombing pass, throwing various items including barrels, fruit and even goons. You have to put up a fight and survive the raft ride to the other side of the lake, where you see the kidnappers landing in a distant field. All the stands in your way The Great Forest of . You battle your way to the outskirts and meet up with a (human) rescue party. They inform you that only you can make it through the forest alive, give you enough supplies to last another day, and send you on your way.
The first few minutes into the forest are pretty easy going. You find various items (NOTE: The player will be informed about various special items etc. here) and do battle with a few beasties – snakes, raccoons, monkeys and offensive plant-life.
You near a deep chasm in the ground, which appear impassable for two reasons: 1) no bridges are in sight and 2) the kidnappers have left you a “present” in the form of Golemn, the giant stone monkey with a fierce temper and the ability to summon and drop boulders from great heights. Within seconds you find yourself dodging the solid rain and exchanging blows with Golemn.
After a vicious battle, you decide the best way to pass the chasm is to slide down one side and climb the other. You find a decent sized length of wood and don it snowboard-like, boarding down the chasm wall. It's not that steep anyway. On your way down you see the kidnappers seem to have decided to send their pilot up again to make your life miserable. The pilot veers in several times, making machine-gun passes into and out of the screen. You fight back, shooting the underside of his plane as he passes.
Eventually, you do so much damage to the plane that the pilot retreats. Wounded, but not dead, you reach the bottom of the chasm. The floor is laden with dense, dead grass. Dead trees speckle the horizon and various sand-dwelling beasts roar. By now it's dark and you have only a lantern (strapped on your back) with which to see. You slowly but surely make your way across the chasm floor.
Along the way, you have to dodge many pits of quicksand. You find the best way to overcome these is to jump over them, using the branches of overhead dead trees.
Poachers have left traps out which you too must avoid. You quickly find out that some traps deal massive damage while others end your life immediately.
By morning, you've reached the other side of the chasm. You search around in your utility pack and get out your grappling hook – one of many utilities the rescue party bestowed upon you. You fire the hook from your rifle and take the tail-end. You begin your ascent.
Up above you hear a familiar sound. The kidnappers plane. This time he chases you up the chasm wall, taking pot-shots with his machine-guns, occasionally laughing in the fashion of a maniac. With one hand on your rope, you swing your rifle out behind you and start to return fire.
After (another) vicious fox-on-plane battle, you are victorious. You destroy his windscreen and land several shots in his cockpit, disabling him and the plane, once and for all.
When you reach the top of the chasm wall, you're greeted by yet another unwanted sight: you're on the face of what appears to be a massive waterfall. There are logs rolling from the top in a fairly unpredictable fashion, but you decide that hopping across them is the best course of action.
Only, when you get about halfway across, the waterfall erupts beside you, sending you tumbling into the lake below. As you're falling, you hear a deep rumbling laughter.
You awake sometime later that day. You've been saved by a local forest-dwelling tribe, who appear friendly. You explain what has happened and they offer you supplies as well as new utility: a repeating rope launcher. They explain that this tool will make it easy to swing the tall trees of the dense forest, allowing you to stay clear of the floor where poachers and various traps reside. After stocking up, you make for the forest – in the direction your were travelling when on the waterfall – repeating rope launcher in hand.
For the next few areas, you remain high above the ground in the trees, battling snakes, monkeys and massive suicidal killer bees.
Finally, after what seems like miles of swinging and trekking, you reach a clearing. Above can be heard a familiar rumbling laughter. You freeze and look up. A behemothic mechanical seahorse is rapidly descending from what seems to be a blimp (which itself is rapidly moving away from view, in the direction you're heading, toward the kidnappers HQ).
The mechanical seahorse sprouts crude legs and begins stamping toward you. When it has closed in it fires a stream of high-pressure water at you. You jump over it. It fires another, this time you run toward the seahorse and allow the stream to pass overhead. It raises one of it's feet but you manage to back-flip out the way just as it slams it into the earth, but the shock-wave knocks you off your feet. The seahorse lets out one of it's now trademark laughs as it fires another stream of water at you.
You eventually realise that it has a weak spot: the opening where the water is sprouting, as it fires. After a few direct hits, the seahorse falls on it's back, presumably beaten. Quickly this is realised not to be the case, as it's head “pops” off the rest of it's body and sprouts (crude!) wings.
The sea-head makes several low passes, trying to hit you directly. It also has a weaker version of it's water stream, which it more or less pours on you from above unless you can dodge it.
After simply hitting the sea-head anywhere several times, it explodes, permanently beaten.
Another little trek through some forest (NOTE: A “cool down” area for the player. I.E. Not too hard even at this stage of the game) and you find yourself face to face with the kidnappers HQ. You enter through the front door and prepare yourself...
Key Features
Make use of various tools during your quest: a hunting rifle, repeating rope launcher and multi-purpose hoe to name a few
20+ levels through which to battle
Jump, duck, climb, swing, earth-board and raft your way to victory
WE NEED MORE!!
Genre
Fast-paced 2D shooter / platformer for all the family.
Platform(s)
Intended development for PC only. Multi-player has not been considered a feasibly option and will not be implemented.